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by Paul Balles

Our liberty depends on
the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost. --Thomas Jefferson

Thereâ€™s no such thing as objectivity.
Everything is seen through conditioned eyes. What we love or hate depends on the kind of
washing our brains have been subjected to. That theory is verifiable. The practical evidence can be seen in the
worldâ€™s press.

The Western mind looks at the world through the familiar eyes of CNN,
BBC, Fox News, CBS, MSNBC, ABC, Reuters or the Associated Press and Rupert
Murdoch. To the Eastern and Middle
Eastern mind, much of the controlled Western perspective of the world doesnâ€™t
make sense. The Middle East TV channel Al Jazeera, broadcasting in Arabic out
of Doha, Qatar, makes sense to 40 million viewers.

The channel has been the object of personal vendettas, agency closures,
assassinations and vilification by a number of regimes and government organizations.
The real reason for the hatred and
attacks? Al Jazeera is the only
completely free public broadcasting organization in the world.

Al Jazeera should be a lesson for journalists from other news
organizations. Not that restrained
journalists could do much to free themselves from the controls that inhibit and
restrict them worldwide, but a few might realize the possibilities of truly
working as the professionals that journalists should be. Because it exercises freedom from political
restraints, here are some of the results experienced by Al Jazeera:

Irresponsible speculation

New Delhi Television (NDTV) is the third media organization where I've
seen a story claiming that "a major insurgency group in Iraq has praised Al Jazeera
television...saying that the Arab satellite station served the fight against
the Americans."

The story has no credibility and should not be making the rounds of the
world press. "The speaker was not identified on tape" the story
goes. Why would any media organization
run a story that has no identifiable source?
For all anyone knows, the statement could have been supplied by
Israelâ€™s Mossad or the US Department of Defence. Both have raged
against Al Jazeera, and both
have an interest in stopping Al Jazeera from broadcasting in English.

The NDTV story reveals that "US officials have frequently
criticised the Qatar-based channel, accusing it of fuelling anti-American
sentiment across the Middle East and giving terrorists a podium."

Personal Vendettas

It's bad enough when an arrogant, self-righteous Ã¼ber general like
Donald Rumsfeld lies. When a so-called
media critic distorts the truth, the result is appalling. Writer Cliff Kinkaid
is consistent in his twisted rants against Al Jazeera. As Oscar Wilde once
observed, "Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative."

Kinkaid outdid himself and several other anti-Muslim journalists in a
bigoted article headlined "Al Jazeera's 'Muslim Scholar'.â€œ He referred to Sheik
Yusuf Qaradawi as â€œa
supporter of violent Jihad,â€ which is a complete distortion of the truth. He
objected to Qaradawiâ€™s outspoken opposition to homosexuality and nudism. Yet,
Kinkaid supposedly supports freedom of expression.

The brand of freedom of speech and
the press, to writers like Kinkaid, means that speakers or writers are free if
they agree with their subjective views. A few days later (September
26, 2006)
he used the most preposterous non-evidence in an attempt to discredit Al Jazeera.

Kinkaid is on a non-stop vendetta against Al Jazeera. A self-proclaimed
editor of the Accuracy in Media (AIM) Report, Kinkaid is anything but accurate
in his own forays. He referred to Al Jazeera
as a â€œterrorist channel,â€ the worst kind of propaganda labelling.

On October 24th, Kinkaid wrote an article for the neocon website GOPUSA
that he headlined "Al Jazeera targets Bush for Death.â€ Later in the
article he claimed "Now its (Al Jazeera's) website ran a headline
suggesting Bush should be dead.â€
The headline Kinkaid referred to was "Death becomes Bush." He completely misinterpreted the headline,
ignoring the fact that the article was about a movie that depicted an
assassination of Bush. Kinkaid also
referred to Al Jazeera as â€œa mouthpiece for Al Qaeda terrorists,â€ another
twisted bit of propaganda based on the fact that Al Jazeera has received and
broadcast tapes from al Qaeda..

More biased negativity

From â€œAl Jazeera's Edge" by Michael Wolff, New York magazine (4/28/2003)
"Itâ€™s pretty hard to adequately describe the level of bloodiness
during an average Al Jazeera newscast. Itâ€™s mesmerizing bloodiness. Itâ€™s not
just red but gooey. Thereâ€™s no cutaway. They hold the shot for the full viscous
effect. Itâ€™s vastly grislier than anything thatâ€™s ever been shown on television
before. Itâ€™s snuff-film calibre."

And later: "Itâ€™s this unfiltered chronicle of mayhem, in the
Israeli view, thatâ€™s been a key provocation during the most recent intifada and
the reoccupation of the West Bank." That makes it pretty
clear that the mayhem itself is ok.
What's not ok is showing it on TV.

It may be as the New York writer said: "â€™Itâ€™s a
propaganda toolâ€™ is the thing you always hear. But relatively speaking, itâ€™s
the opposite of propagandaâ€”nobody is being force-fed. Rather, the audience gets
what the audience wants. Itâ€™s a ratings thing. A media rather than an
ideological thing. Money rather than
blood. Or money from blood."

Fairer evaluations

Ian Urbina commented in Asia Times,
"Al Jazeeraâ€™s editorial edginess is its mark of distinction. In the world
of straitjacketed Arab media, Al Jazeera has one of the only free hands. Its
talk shows can legitimately claim to showcase the full range of Arab opinion -
the good, the bad and the ugly--on global affairs, and their featured debates
put the sleep-inducing talking heads on American cable shows to shame."

Urbina added, "Indeed, Al Jazeera gets hit from all sides. The
Israelis have complained about the station's alleged pro-Palestinian bias,
mostly because its reporters refer to Palestinian fighters as
"martyrs". But hard-line Palestinians say the station is a bastion of
Zionism for having invited Israeli officials, including Ehud Barak and Shimon
Peres, on the air. Iraq yanked the credentials of Al
Jazeera's Baghdad correspondent for stories considered too
pro-Western, while Kuwait recently blocked the station from
using its satellite link because it considered the channel's coverage too
pro-Iraq."

National reactions to
perceived criticism

In December 2002, Saudi Arabia's King Abdulla refused to attend a
GCC summit in Doha,
Qatar because Al Jazeera had been
"disrespectful to the Saudi royal family." The Saudis had actually
recalled their ambassador to Qatar in September.

According to Urbina, "Jordan closed Al Jazeera's news bureau in
Amman after a Syrian commentator criticized Jordanâ€™s peace treaty with Israel,
describing Jordan as "an artificial entity" populated by "a
bunch of Bedouins living in an arid desert..

â€œKuwait also ordered Al Jazeera's bureau closed after an Islamic
militant calling an Al Jazeera phone-in program from Europe suggested that
Kuwait's ruler, Sheik Jaber al-Jaber al-Sabah, should be ousted for agreeing to
extend the vote in Kuwaiti elections to women."

Thus, when Tunisia pulled its ambassador to Doha recently because they claimed that
Al Jazeera had insulted the Tunisian government, the charge was nothing new.

According to 7 Days (out of the UAE), The Tunisian move followed the
airing by Al Jazeera of interviews with Moncef Marzouki, an opponent of the
regime of Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, in which he called for
"civil resistance." Al Jazeera "ignores truth and objectivity
every time that it deals with current affairs in Tunisia â€¦ apparently waging a hostile
campaign aimed at harming Tunisia," the Tunisian foreign
ministry said.

Further commenting, 7 Days wrote: Al Jazeera would welcome "any
Tunisian official who would want to speak to the channel," Khanfar (director
general) said. "When we host certain figures, it does not mean that Al Jazeera
endorses their positions," he said. The television station broadcast an
interview with the French-based Marzouki on October 14, and another on
Saturday, several hours after he returned to Tunisia.

One interesting aspect of blaming Qatar for what Al Jazeera broadcasts is
the automatic association of the local media with the government. Those who have objected to what Al Jazeera
broadcasts have been admitting that in other countries media is controlled by
the governments.

This happens despite Qatar's efforts to assure others that it
doesn't exercise control over Al Jazeera.
From this it would seem that Al Jazeera is really the only broadcaster
that's truly free. Broadcasters elsewhere are not.

BBC reports additional
criticism

They received angry criticism for filming and broadcasting pictures that
other networks have not got or will not show.

Al Jazeera drew criticism from the US for broadcasting footage of killed
and captured American soldiers.

UK Prime Minister Tony Blair has
expressed "horror" at the broadcast of pictures believed to show two
dead British soldiers.

Its reporters have at times been banned or harassed in Egypt, Kuwait, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority. It
has been criticised by Saudi Arabia and was according to Al Jazeera
described by Bahrain as being pro-Zionist.

The criticisms are an attempt to muzzle Al Jazeera.

MQ7 Net reports

Al Jazeera, often dubbed "the Arab CNN," gained world fame
through its exclusive reporting of the US military intervention in Afghanistan in late 2001 and the airing of
videotapes of Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

This has earned it the wrath of Washington, which accuses Al Jazeera of being
a mouthpiece for Islamist extremists, notably in Iraq, where the channel has been banned
from reporting since 2004.

Its offices in Kabul and Baghdad were both hit by US strikes,
despite the channel having told the US where they were, while a leaked
memo last year suggested US President George W. Bush considered
bombing the channel's Doha headquarters in 2004.

If you can't shut them
up, detain or assassinate them

An Al Jazeera cameramen detained in Afghanistan is still being held without charge
at the US detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, while one of the channel's
journalists was jailed last year for seven years accused in a Spanish court of
collaborating with Al-Qaeda. One of Al Jazeeraâ€™s reporters was killed in Iraq.

Freedom too important
to yield

Explaining the reluctance to go private, Al Jazeera's editor-in-chief
said: "A government which funds you and gives you a wide margin of freedom
is better than private capital subjected to commercial pressures."

Having referred to its 10th anniversary, on November 1st, of Arabic
broadcasting to more than 40 million viewers, Al Jazeera will launch its
English service beginning on November 15th.
They hope to reach 40 million households in Europe, Africa and Southeast Asia.

A recent poll found 53% of Americans opposed the launch of the channel
and two-thirds of Americans thought the US government should not allow it
entry to the US market. So much for American love
of free speech and a free press.

Tomorrow

According to 9news.com, "the station says its research shows some
of the world's one billion English speakers, including Americans, thirst for
news from a non-Western perspective.

"The ever-contentious Middle East will be its specialty. And the
news, including coverage of Israel, will be served up from an Arab
perspective, Al Jazeera executives have said."

The West doesn't appreciate the freedom exercised by Al Jazeera; and
they like its balancing perspectives even less.
An English broadcast service that's not bound by commercial
considerations and one that's sponsored by funding that doesn't interfere with
policy or reporting is long overdue.

Al Jazeera is about to show the English-speaking world what it really
means to be a free press.